


Bumblebees are out

by GalekhXigisi



Category: IT (Movies - Muschietti), IT - Stephen King
Genre: Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, M/M, Multi, No Beta, R + E + S, Richie Tozier Has ADHD, Trans Male Richie Tozier, Trans Richie Tozier, Transphobia, Unfinished Oneshot
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-10-30
Updated: 2019-10-30
Packaged: 2021-01-13 11:34:33
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,490
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21243422
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/GalekhXigisi/pseuds/GalekhXigisi
Summary: Richie leaves, tired of listening to his parents fighting. He goes to the kissing bridge and the little hideaway.





	Bumblebees are out

Derry held lots of secrets. 

It held the secret of the boy who always liked to add the sad little  _ \+ S _ to the end of the scribbled letters on the Kissing bridge with chalk because the boy knew it would always be washed away by the rain that seemed to fall far too often. 

It knew the secret about the boy whose mother lied relentlessly and made every single doctor write a fake prescription or else she would raise all Hell about how they were  _ “mistreating” _ her son. 

It held the secrets about the boy who didn’t start off as a boy, having moved to Derry with parents whose marriage never fit and only one of which was anywhere near accepting of the transition. 

It held secrets, enough secrets to put the government to shame. It held the hearts of so many, held it close to its center, as well as a clown who never made life any easier for anyone except the angry boy who was stuck on killing. 

Now, it feels like a prison. Richie knew it was a prison, it  _ had _ to be. There was no possible way that it couldn’t be. Not when surpassing the invisible barrier meant he’d never be able to remember until his inevitable return. No one ever truly died in Derry, as they say, so he guesses the rest of the inmates will always be there to the very fucking end with him, sitting in their eternal suffering because Derry was fucking  _ Hell. _ But, for some reason, thinking like that makes the boy cringe. 

He grimaces as he listens to his mother’s angry yells from downstairs. It really wasn’t new. He had heard it before. It was about him, about the boy who always wore a too-tight undershirt that was only known about by his closest friends and family. Even then, only certain family members that actually talked to the Toziers, which were practically only the Wheelers now. It didn’t matter. Richie preferred not having to explain that his name was Richie now and he’s a fucking boy to his uncle at least ten times every single time they saw each other. It was a fucking pain in his ass that he didn’t want to deal with anymore. 

_ “She’s not a boy,” _ his mother yells. She was in the living room, just at the front door on the ground level of the house. 

Richie was at the top level, on the exact opposite side of the house with his door shut and the vents all closed, the only thing open about his room being the window, which let in the cool fall air. It killed his allergies, but he prefers the sound of the wind over the yelling. Even then, he still hears his angry father yell,  _ “No, Maggie, Richie is our fuckin’ son!” _

It happens every night. The sounds of glass shattering follow, notably the alcohol bottles Maggie kept in the garage freezer like the thing wasn’t already it’s own icebox. However, he hears the sounds of his mother’s bag getting dropped and the woman angrily shifting through it. 

_ “I got divorce papers,” _ she says, the sounds of her hands slamming down on the table following,  _ “And I’m takin’ Rosie with me.” _

Richie doesn’t want to hear this. His mother kept bringing up the papers but the couple always managed to repent by the morning with even more yelling and far more anger that simply didn’t need to happen. So, he slips out of bed, staying near the edges of the room, pressed against the furniture. The wood didn’t creak there as often. His parents don’t care. He knows they hear it, as well as him grabbing the same bag he packed every single time he got home from school just after showering. He could sleep in the clubhouse tonight. As he had found, he and Bev were there most often, Bill sometimes joining. 

He slips out of the window, careful with his movements as he presses onto one of the many branches of the giant tree that sat in their backyard. He couldn’t walk out the front door. As his mother always said, _ the front door is for clients, my dear Rosie. _ He wasn’t Rosemary anymore and he didn’t want to hear his mother sob her hear out because  _ You used to be my baby girl, Rosie! Now you hang out with boys and that slut, Beverly! She’s rubbing off on you, my sweet, sweet girl! _ He stopped going around her as much as he could afford after that. 

He presses himself against the trunk, slipping down with trained ease. He didn’t have much upper body strength, but his skinny ass was strong enough to hold himself up when he needed to. He could climb trees and the gym’s rope with enough ease that very few ever batted an eye at. He never minded, always finding himself unfazed by the few eyes. He didn’t want the attention, not when he would rather be recognized as Trashmouth Tozier, the gay boy that sucked flamer cock. 

He walks down the cool streets, leaves crunching beneath his feet. No one was usually up so late, not unless they were a teenager wanting to get the Hell away from their parents like Richie was. Usually, that’s not actually very many people. He’ll occasionally see one of the other losers and they hang out at the quarry, sharing stories or just existing. Hell, sometimes they even talked it out, although that was so incredibly rare since Richie didn’t like talking about his family, not when he didn’t bring anyone to his house. He didn’t like anyone coming over if he could help it. 

Richie’s body aches as he walks. From what he had found out over the past few years, he and Beverly had never synced up on cycles, his being random and hers being so painfully normal compared to his, nothing more than the typical run of the mill menstrual. They hung out daily, and yet, they still managed to never sync up. He thinks they might kill each other then, but, well, still, it’s odd. He could already feel the impending pressure. 

He groans, loud and annoyed, only halfway down the street. He glares at the moon. The moon didn’t do anything to him. He knows it’s just a giant space rock that could easily kill him within a second but chose not to, and yet it stood as his current focus of anger. He didn’t want to be mad at the moon. 

Richie trots down the street with a glare at the sidewalk. The crunching leaves annoy the shit out of him. Realistically, they shouldn’t, but they sure as fuck do. Everything manages to piss him off when the impending floodgates opening happens, leaving him in pain with anger taking over. He had said more than just a few things in the heat of the moment that he ended up severely regretting. Hell, his first and only physical fight with Bill had been during one of those times, as well as the entire Pennywise bullshit that still made his stomach burn with fear every single time he thought about it. 

He trudges forward, walking along the Kissing Bridge. He’s been thinking about doing this since he even wrote the cursed  _ R + E _ on the bridge. Now, he kneels down, pulling the pocket knife out of his bag. He looks at his handiwork with clouded eyes. He should have written it the instant he wrote the first bits. 

He shakily writes  _ \+ S _ to the end, breathing out a soft smile as his lips turn up at it.

It feels like he’s gotten some sort of pressure lifted off his chest, one that he never knew he had until now. 

He smiles at it, smiles so wide that his cheeks actually  _ hurt. _ Slowly, he forces himself up, silently wondering if the remaining bits of chalk that were always there would be washed off by tomorrow’s rain, leaving the genuine final draft instead of the rough copy. 

He makes his way to the clubhouse with a smile on his lips and flashlight in hand. It’s calming. He’s taken this path at least four times a day since Ben showed it to him just after the rock war. It had been his hideaway for so long now, his typically first resort when it came to getting away from his parents. And when he arrives, he finds the hatch open, light beaming from it and the radio softly playing a tune he didn’t know. It could’ve meant Ben was in there, but Ben only ever stayed just to get out of the house. His family was amazing, so that crossed him out rather quickly. He usually told them if he was going to be staying, anyways, often prompting a group sleepover since the only other person that really liked it at home could’ve maybe been Stanley, and even that was a stretch. 

He drops his bag through the hatch and jumps down, not caring if whoever was down there had their tongue down the other’s throat. Really, the only ones that could’ve would be Ben and Beverly  _ (which had already been crossed out), _ Bill and Mike, or Stan and Eddie. As he finds, it is Stan and Eddie, the two talking over a shared comment. 

“Mi amigos,” he greets with a two-fingered salute. “You two canoodling or some shit?” 

Eddie cringes while Stan rolls his eyes. The shortest of the group quickly spits, “No one calls it canoodling anymore, Trashmouth.” 

Richie forces a smirk at the other. “Not denying it, I see.” 

The group knew Richie was gay. Hell, there wasn’t a single way they couldn’t catch it, not after the two Bowers boys made such a big show out of it. And, Hell, a lot of the group  _ was. _ As Richie had told there, the was nothing straight about a group of six boys and one girl, especially not when one of them was formerly a girl himself. The Losers had taken to his past in a wonderful stride, but that had been because the singular time he had ever taken them to his house, his mother had burst in, drunk and crying because _ Rosie, my dear, you’re slutting around with these boys and that girl? Rosie, Rosie, my love,  _ ** _please,_ ** _ think about yourself here. _ His father had yelled something about Richie being  _ Fucking Richie, our son, Maggie, let ‘em be. _ It had been lost within the sands of time. 

“Shut up, dude,” the other glares, cheeks heating somewhat. “Why the fuck are you here?” 

“Got bored,” Richie counters as he kicks his bag away. It wasn’t a full lie,  _ really. _

Stan raises a suspicious brow. 

Richie feels sick, the smile falling within an instant as he moves to sit on the ground by the hammock, leaning against one of the poles to it. “They’re fighting again,” he says softly, “And she pulled out the divorce papers so I just… Left.” 

Eddie seems to nod from his spot. They didn’t know too much about the Toziers, but they knew how shit it was after the little tidbits Richie had told them and the scares they had seen all caused by Maggie, hidden from Wentworth because Richie is awfully sure his mom would get custody. He doesn’t think he could stay with her alone. 

“Do you want to talk about it,” Stan asks in a soft voice, one that’s full of support in a way Richie only ever really heard from his father and singular cousin. “Or do you want a distraction?” 

Richie frowns. “I don’t…  _ Know, _ Stan?” He  _ doesn’t. _ From what he had been told, that was something to do with his ADHD, some sort of disconnection that he couldn’t remember the name of, despite his clear interest in the topic. It felt overwhelming. 

“Okay,” Stan slowly says, getting up from the hammock to sit by the other, slow with his movements and giving Richie far more than enough times to tell him to stop or to move away. Richie didn’t. He never did. He liked the touch, not that he would ever admit it. “How about you start talking about it and if that gets to be too much, we can give you a distraction?” 

Eddie sits beside them, just as goodnatured as Stan. After a moment of silence, Richie manages a nod for the two. 

He brings his knees to his chest, arms wrapping tightly around his legs as he looks at the ground. He was doing great a few minutes ago. Why was now so different? 

“I can’t stand hearing her call me Rosie so much. It’s the exact same fight with the exact same lines. She calls me her little flower and dad says that I’m Richard fucking Tozier. Then, mom starts drinking and he starts telling her to stop chugging because she’s violent when she gets drunk.” he shutters, fingers unconsciously running across the scarred wrist. “Then, she tells him to go fuck himself and they just… Keep fighting because Ma doesn’t like to be wrong and she thinks she’s not wrong that she had a daughter, despite saying for the entire pregnancy that she was going to have a boy.” 

He has to pause at that, taking a few shaky inhales. He had his room painted blue when he was a baby. Now, his current one was green, much to his mother’s dismay. 

“She throws a bottle after a few more minutes of yelling. She’s just starting to get drunk,  _ really _ drunk. She’ll pull out the same divorce papers she’s had for months because Dad doesn’t want to lose me and I know I can’t lose him. We’re on good terms, finally, and she’s just… Not okay with it, I guess. And she’ll tell him to piss off, that she can get any other man in this town and probably some of the women, too. She’ll act like she doesn’t whore herself out and doesn’t cheat at least twice a day. She’ll act like we don’t have enough money and just…” 

He eyes the walls, turning to the other two. “Can I have a distraction, actually?” He needs one. He really does because this is too much and he hates this conversation because his mother tried to pull him into one of her schemes a few times too many, all with his father right there. 

He gets the distraction he asks for. The three boys end up curled together in the hammock, just barely fitting. Honestly, they’re all confused as to how it doesn’t immediately fall. It certainly wasn’t up the best. Sure, they could try to tie it good, but it was a cheap hammock that Beverly had stolen from her house, one of the old things her mom owned that she was tired of collecting dust in the spare room that her father refused to let her open. 

**Author's Note:**

> I might finish this at some point, but not for now
> 
> Anyways, please leave comments! I take constructive criticism!
> 
> And please join my Discord server!  
https://discord.gg/eGkwayy


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